Saturday, January 7, 2012

BRIEF IMPRESSIONS: L.A. NOIRE

Just nabbed the complete edition off of Steam for $13. I have to admit, I've been on the fence about it. It's getting great reviews, but it just didn't seem up my alley.

I've been playing for two hours now. It's....interesting.

The art design is gorgeous, but it dips into serious uncanny valley territory, especially when the heads/faces have MUCH better detail and animation than the rest of the body. The heads and faces are realistic to the point of being creepy. Every tiny nuance and muscle twitch and shadow is captured flawlessly. The bodies, not so much. I mean they're good, top notch. In any other game, I'd be impressed. Just...compared to the heads and faces, they look like shit.

Then there's the gameplay. It's intriguing, but not really FUN. The investigation part is okay, the few action scenes are pretty decent, but the interviews are awful and seem arbitrary. Even the tutorial gives you no hints other than "watch for cues", and then tells you if you're right or wrong. It never gives you any of said cues to watch for. They don't seem to follow any logic, and you only have Truth, Lie, or Doubt as options. You can't really decide what Cole is going to say. It's pretty much trial and error.

And then there's the tech side of the graphics. I have a top notch rig that can play this game on its highest settings without breaking a sweat. Yet even on these settings, there are jaggies like I haven't seen since the N64, and the most ridiculous pop-ins I've seen in a long time. Especially while driving; detail like storefronts or billboards are colored blurs until you're close to them. The draw distance is just...sad.

The game isn't BAD, it just has some issues. And I only played for two hours, so I'm going to keep giving it a chance. But I wanted to share the first impressions I got from it.

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About Me

My name's Tom, and I am the Cranky Old Gamer. I was born in 1979, which makes me ancient in video game years. I grew up with gaming, and it is my biggest passion. I was playing Atari 2600 when I was old enough to hold the joystick. This blog is all about that passion. I will talk about games from all time ranges, new to classic, big companies to indie devs, news that gets me excited, and reviews of games I play, whether new or old. This blog is all about the things I love in gaming, the things I hate, and everything in between.